Our heart is the most essential organ in our body and is responsible for nothing more than pumping and circulating oxygenated blood throughout our body. Without it, our body system will not function. It is our heart that makes our cardiovascular system work, giving us the life we have now. This is why it is very important to maintain a healthy heart. However, there are some factors that affect the health of our heart and cause heart pain after we eat. These include eating the wrong kinds of food and in excessive amounts, which can lead to heart and chest pain after we eat. It is alarming to know that an unhealthy diet due to unhealthy eating habits may affect our healthy heart, or worse, our lives.

What is Heart Pain?

Just like in chest pain, heart pain is commonly experienced within the chest and sometimes in the upper abdomen area of the body. It could be a symptom of many things like lack of exercise, overweight, excessive intake of bad cholesterol, heart disease and many others. It is important to understand what your heart is telling you. More often than not, heart pain may only mean that you have bad eating habits and eating the wrong kinds of food.

Kinds of Heart Pain:

1. Angina or Pectoris Angina

Pectoris angina s a severe pain felt in the chest area of the body, caused by a lack of the blood supply that gives tissues the oxygen the body needs. It is usually brought on by too little physical exercise and a poor diet. Angina occurs when the coronary arteries, the same arteries that supply blood to the heart, are blocked by fatty deposits. When this happens, the artery walls precipitate, causing the flow of the blood to diminish.

2. Heart Attack

Heart attack in any sense is a serious issue. It can be felt as a more severe and prolonged heart pain that could kill anyone with just one attack. Heart attacks occur when the flow of the oxygen-rich blood going to the heart is blocked. When the flow is blocked and unable to be restored as soon as possible, sections of the heart muscle begin to die. Heart pain due to heart attack is mostly felt in the centre area of the chest, spreading over both arms, especially on the left side and up to the lower jaw.

Why do we experience heart pain after eating?

As we age, we begin to notice the effects of eating the wrong kinds of food when we were young. Aside from a lack of exercise, excessive eating and eating the wrong types of food have a huge effect on our heart’s health. This effect may serve as a long-time consequence which, if not corrected, can cause heart disease, heart pain or even death. Most of the time heart pain after eating is caused by the food that we eat. Food that is starchy, fatty and high in bad cholesterol may block the flow of the blood to the heart, causing us to feel heart pain. But what do we mean exactly by “unhealthy” kinds of food? This is food that has a large amount of salt, sugar and saturated fats and few nutrients. This food is commonly called “junk food”. And because it is high in bad nutrients, it can cause blood pressure and obesity which in the end may result in heart pain or disease.

You don’t have to be a physician in order to understand the effects of unhealthy food on your heart. What most of us fail to remember, is that unhealthy food will do nothing except produce a poor unhealthy heart, leading to heart attacks and diseases like atherosclerosis and angina.

How to Avoid Heart Pain

They say “you are what you eat”. It sounds clichéd but it is true. For most people, healthy food is not good-to-taste food. However, what they probably refuse to understand is that these healthy foods are the exact foods that their heart needs; food like almonds, oranges, kale, garlic, dark chocolates, pomegranates, lentils and sardines. These healthy foods will all help to protect you from experiencing heart pain and other heart diseases. So next time you think of your heart, try to remember that regular exercise, rest, constrained bad vices, sufficient water intake and happy thoughts are great but not enough. You must also consider the importance of a balanced diet and correct eating habits to avoid having too many health complications as you grow older. Live healthy!

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John Pope has been working in the healthcare industry for eight years. Whilst maintaining his medical practice he also performs regular consultations for hospitals and other healthcare institutions. He lives in Chicago, IL with his wife and two children.